small business Archives - Interfanatic Digital Marketing with Web Site Maintenance & Design

Courage: Palos Verdes Peninsula Chamber of Commerce – Interfanatic Customer Spotlight

“He who is not courageous enough to take risks will accomplish nothing in life.”
– Muhammad Ali

Risk-taking – not for the wary. Putting yourself out there, doing something new, taking the road less taken – all signs of courage. All signs of a person starting their own new business.

There’s an audacity about doing things your way and making it work. Especially when you have others depending on you to make it work.

In a way, this quote is a little shallow because it comes from somebody for whom this advice worked well. There are millions of others who have taken this advice and for whom it did not go well. We don’t hear from them, though…

For months, we’ve been told to limit our contact with others. Some took it seriously. Others did not. Some chose to take risks with their own lives, but more importantly, with the lives of others. It comes back to which information sources we choose to trust, I suppose. Many people distrusted the advice of people they didn’t want to hear, or people they didn’t want to hear from. The result is, while things were under control for a bit, everything those people have been telling us is true. This isn’t political, we were in a tenuous state, and now things are substantially worse because of the risk takers.

So: take risks. But be prudent. And mind your information sources. Maybe the ones telling you what you want to hear aren’t the most trustworthy.

Courage: An Interfanatic Quality

We take risks every day. Design is risk. To tell the story in a new way, you have to be audacious – you have to find a way to make your customer stand out while not taking too much risk. Their reputation depends on it.

But we are prudent about the risks we take. We don’t take risks because we want to, or just for the sake of taking risks. We do it when it’s required and when the payoff is worth the effort.

Palos Verdes Peninsula Chamber of Commerce – Supporting the Courageous

Every small business who deals with the Palos Verdes Peninsula Chamber of Commerce understands risks and the rewards that may come. Some have reaped those rewards, but many are just making the attempt.

“The PVP Chamber works hard to be a resource and to help small businesses survive and thrive.”

Every small business I meet in or around Palos Verdes, I recommend they join the PVP Chamber. I know the work the PVP Chamber staff puts forth for its membership. When things are good or like now, when things are tough, they work hard to be a resource and to help those small businesses survive and thrive.

So they know risk – and they know courage. They encourage courage, and try to help their small businesses put their best foot forward.

It was great fun to work with the Chamber on their Social Media efforts. We helped them get the word out about the PV Street Fair using their social media accounts as a tool. We then strategized and implemented a successful ongoing social media campaign, celebrating their member businesses, until they had the resources to to take over the project themselves.

The Palos Verdes Peninsula Chamber of Commerce is great to work with. They’re fantastic to have on your side.

Interfanatic Service Focus: Interfanatic Power Social Media Advertising

Social Media can be brilliantly effective when the stars align, but getting that post to go viral, while the dream, is a bit like hitting the lottery. It can happen, but…

So if you need your posts in front of more eyes, the answer is Social Media Advertising. It doesn’t necessarily guarantee engagement, but it does guarantee reach. And when handled properly, that reach is effective, and it helps your engagement. When not handled properly, it’s a waste of money.

We really enjoy helping our customers dial in their social media. We can use our experience to help you!

Interfanatic: Encouraging Courage

We like to think we’re like the Palos Verdes Peninsula Chamber in that we help small businesses put their best foot forward. In that way, we’re really complimentary businesses. We’re trying to help the audacious make their mark while minimizing the big risks they have to take to make it happen.

This week’s image:
Interfanatic‘s founder, Ryan Delane, takes or creates every image you see in our social feed.

Courage, an Interfanatic Quality. Interfanatic Digital Marketing founder Ryan Delane takes or creates every image you see in our social feed.

Courage is forged in the fire of risk. If a small business emerges, they may be burnt and hammered, but they are more likely to last the further tests that come at them.

Courage: Palos Verdes Peninsula Chamber of Commerce – Interfanatic Customer Spotlight Read More »

Honor: West Coast Jewelers – Interfanatic Customer Spotlight

Customer Spotlight, Partners

“If you honor and serve the people who work for you, they will honor and serve you.”
– Mary Kay Ash

Another week, another week closer to honorable leadership?

This quote speaks to me because I was raised around this philosophy. I grew up in a family business with thousands of incredibly appreciated workers.

All business must be honorable if it is to survive, thrive, and do well for the community around it.

This week, we’re helping a new business launch. And I guarantee you that in their line of work, they would go nowhere fast were they not honorable.

Honor: An Interfanatic Quality

When you work with honor, people know they can depend on you. Trust comes from doing deals with honor.

There’s no reason to go into business if you refuse to hold your honor and that of your customers in esteem.

Hopefully, that’s why we’re here after over 20 years. We always treat our customers with honor. I know our customers appreciate the work we do.

West Coast Jewelers – Bringing Business with Honor

The cash for gold business is not one known for honor. But Firas Sayegh and his family business are determined to raise the bar on their competition.

“West Coast Jewelers pay for gold like coin dealers pay: the most.”

It’s a difficult thing to open any business. But the thing about West Coast Jewelers is that they have a very clear unique selling proposition. They do custom jewelry for beauty, and also for investment.

Everyone knows that taking scrap gold to a cash for gold place is the best way to lose money. They pay the least – sometimes a criminally small amount – for gold. Jewelers pay the next most, and coin shops pay the most. As West Coast Jewelers works with bullion dealers, they’re almost like a coin dealer who does jewelry. They pay for gold like coin dealers pay.

But the most important thing Firas brings to his business is his honor. And he knows this. You don’t get far in the gold and jewelry business cheating people. Not ever, but especially in the age of social media. Firas Sayegh and West Coast Jewelers are transparent and embrace social media, like so many young entrepreneurs. The people of West Coast Jewelers deal in honor.

Interfanatic Service Focus: Interfanatic Power Landing Page Creation & Optimization

When you set up your new digital advertising campaign, it’s always most efficient to pair your ad campaign with a landing page to match.

We set up landing pages. And then we watch the data and learn from it. We improve. We keep tweaking until we get the most out of the campaign and landing page, making them work together beautifully.

Get more from your digital ad spend. Get us to set up and optimize a landing page that converts.

Interfanatic: Dealing in Honor

We’re here by the grace of God to help you by doing what we do best. And we do it for you honestly, with honor.

This week’s image:
Interfanatic‘s founder, Ryan Delane, takes or creates every image you see in our social feed.

Honor, an Interfanatic Quality. Interfanatic Digital Marketing founder Ryan Delane takes or creates every image you see in our social feed.

I remember watching Steven Tyler talk about the way he wanted to honor his fans. It’s not the same thing as honoring your workers, but it seems like the right message. You have to truly honor your fans with truth, hard work to create excellent results. We got to go see Aerosmith in concert last year in Vegas, and man what a show. It was a wonderful experience, and I felt honored to be there, and honored by the Aerosmith troupe.

Honor: West Coast Jewelers – Interfanatic Customer Spotlight Read More »

Goodness: Smoll – Interfanatic Customer Spotlight

Customer Spotlight, Partners

“The roots of all goodness lie in the soil of appreciation for goodness.”
– His Holiness, Dalai Lama XIV

As we sit, America is in tumult, reaping exactly what she sowed. It’s a lot to take in.

So let’s take a moment to appreciate goodness. There is innate goodness in all people. Some people choose to celebrate that, while some people choose to focus on our differences.

The Dalai Lama, despite his life’s journey, chooses to give us a positive nugget in this week’s quote. The roots of goodness come in the appreciation of goodness. Apparently, the corollary is also true; when goodness is lost, we have to deal with the roots of discontent, which lie in appreciation of discontent.

Right now, we have more people interested in us hearing that we can’t tell them what to do than we have people interested in speaking for the greater good. When you assert your liberty over someone else’s, the result is oppression of the other. That’s not real liberty.

Appreciating the good of others begins the growth of all goodness. And that’s what Smoll does.

Smoll appreciates the goodness of great small businesses around our country. It celebrates that goodness. It makes itself a root for goodness and appreciation for good small business.

Goodness: An Interfanatic Quality

At the end of the day, I choose to take or reject a client based on their goodness. I have a tough client right now. Extremely difficult to communicate with. But I knew that going in, and I decided to take on the project because I believe him to be a good person. I appreciate the goodness and in this case I’ll work with that despite otherwise intense difficulties.

That’s not the case with Smoll – they’re great to work with! And I think much of that comes from the innate goodness they work toward.

But, we know what it’s like to work with difficult clients and we know what it’s like to work with great ones. We always prioritize being great to work with because that’s how good things happen.

Smoll, Celebrating the Good of Local, Small Businesses

Where do you go when you need something? You go where you know. You go where you trust. Often, what you know, what you trust is a big chain. It’s the McDonald’s model. When I’m in Shanghai, I know with certainty that a McDonald’s is not the best hamburger I can get. Shanghai is filled with excellent restaurants, with even some that have hamburgers, and surely a couple that make great hamburgers. But if I don’t feel like seeking out that restaurant, when I want a burger quick and I see McDonald’s on the corner, that’s where I go. (Not me literally; I’m the type to seek out the burger if that’s what I want. But…) You know what to expect. Probably a reasonably inexpensive Big Mac and you have a pretty good idea of what it will taste like.

Then, there’s Yelp. Yelp is extortion. Often, I see small business beholden to Yelp for their shady business practices. When people go to Yelp, it’s to air grievances much more often than it is to share praise. And being beholden to Yelp is expensive. Unless you have an excellent system and process in place to ensure a good working relationship with your customers, you’re likely to get bad reviews that soil the good ones.

So that’s why there’s Smoll. It’s designed around celebrating and helping to promote the great small businesses in your community. It features special businesses from every community around the United States so that you can find businesses you’ll want to work with that you may not know about. Maybe they don’t do Yelp and maybe you haven’t heard of them. But there’s a great, hardworking team at that local small business you would really enjoy working with.

And that’s why we work with Smoll. That’s exactly what we want and what we want to do: celebrate the goodness in our local communities and small businesses.

Interfanatic: Finding and Celebrating Goodness

Let’s take a moment to find the goodness in each other – the common ground we can agree upon. We should not focus on our differences. Let’s appreciate the goodness in each of our perspectives.

This week’s image:
Interfanatic‘s founder, Ryan Delane, takes or creates every image you see in our social feed.

Goodness, an Interfanatic Quality. Interfanatic Digital Marketing founder Ryan Delane takes or creates every image you see in our social feed. — Goodness, an Interfanatic Quality. *Interfanatic* Digital Marketing founder Ryan Delane takes or creates every image you see in our social feed.

The purity of sunflowers – that’s some righteous goodness. My wifey bought these for our table and I couldn’t help but revel in their beauty and splash of color. It’s nice to have beautiful things around to remind you of goodness.

Goodness: Smoll – Interfanatic Customer Spotlight Read More »

Tranquility: Palos Verdes Coin Exchange – Interfanatic Customer Spotlight

Customer Spotlight, Partners

“…it is neither wealth nor splendor, but tranquility and occupation that give happiness.”
– Thomas Jefferson

Tranquility gives happiness. Of course it does; the opposite of tranquility (whether it be good or bad) doesn’t let the mind rest.

We chose this quote as it’s a good reminder to let competent professionals take care of their parts of your business for you, so you don’t have to worry about it.

This Jefferson quote, from a letter to his newlywed sister, is actually kinda funny when taken in context. He’s almost making excuses for her new husband, allowing as how he doesn’t know the man to be great, but he will do for her. He’ll keep her happy through tranquility. Not through acts of greatness, but by keeping things calm and being occupied. It’s like he’s telling his sister, “Anna, I don’t this guy that well, but I’m sure he’ll be just fine.” Hardly the glowing platitudes you would hope for.

Ah, older brother looking out for his sister.

But the point of all of this is: Isn’t it better to not be stressed out? Yes, of course it is. So let Interfanatic do our job for you so you can focus on your greatness.

Tranquility: An Interfanatic Quality

In a crisis scenario, it’s easy to get excited. A website goes down, a credit card API breaks, a home page stops showing up in search results – these are all things that can stress a business owner out.

We don’t like being stressed out, either.

That’s why we have systems and procedures in place to make sure these bad things don’t happen often, and when they do, we fix them quickly. We keep this stuff from happening. Of course, stuff happens – you can’t always keep it from happening. But our policies and procedures help everyone keep a cool head and we minimize the impact to the businesses we work with so they don’t have to stress about them.

And that’s how tranquility is a quality and a virtue that we strive for. To keep things calm on our end so you can focus on other things. (It helps us keep our sanity, too!) There’s a reason there aren’t many businesses around like ours after twenty years. And there’s a reason we still are.

Palos Verdes Coin Exchange: Tranquility for Customers During a Stressful Time

Thus, we think of Ron and Vincent at Palos Verdes Coin Exchange. They’re coin dealers in Palos Verdes who know how to instill tranquility in transactions.

People go to coin dealers for a few reasons. The most popular are:

Somebody they know has passed on, and that person had a coin collection.
They’re a coin collector and they’re looking for a deal on a coin they need for their collection.
They found something in their pocket they think could be valuable and are hoping they won the lottery.

None of these mindsets is tranquil. When you lose a loved one, it’s stressful. No matter the situation, settling an estate is stressful.

Shopping for coins is stressful. You don’t know if the dealer is being fair or if you can really afford to spend this much money on your collection even though you really want to.

Thinking you won the lottery is stressful – it’s exciting, and can be fun. But it’s still an experience outside the norm, and therefore, stressful.

Ron and Vincent know this – indeed they carry wisdom beyond their years. They look young, but the fact is – THEY KNOW THEIR STUFF.

I’ve known Ron for a long time. When I worked at PCGS, when I worked at a coin shop, when I used to collect, Ron always impressed me. Vincent has learned everything from Ron, and he knows his stuff, too. Ron knows how to buy coins and how to sell them. He’s settled plenty of estate coin collections, he deals with dealers and collectors daily, and he knows what coins are valuable and which ones are not, even as they confuse experienced and amateur collectors alike.

That all comes from years of experience.

So, it’s with great tranquility that those of us who know Ron and Vincent deal with Ron and Vincent. We know they’re pros. Their offers are fair. Their prices are fair. When we buy or sell coins, we know we’re getting a square deal – maybe better. And I always think of Palos Verdes Coin Exchange when I make a referral to a local. The other “dealers” around here who deal with the public don’t get my referral. (Shapiro is great, but he doesn’t have a public storefront.)

“…it’s with great tranquility that those of us who know [Palos Verdes Coin Exchange] deal with [them].“

I never hesitate to send collectors, estate settlers, and other professional dealers to Ron and Vincent at Palos Verdes Coin Exchange. We know the transaction will go as well as it can go.

When I found out Palos Verdes Coin Exchange had expanded into a storefront, I was thrilled and proud. Interfanatic does not help them with their website for now, but we are handling a modest digital advertising campaign for them, and it’s going extremely well. It is our great pleasure to deal with Ron, Vince, and PVCE, and to aid them in their success.

Interfanatic The Works Domain Concierge

One of those niggling things business owners have to deal with is their domain name. Keeping hold of your domain name is absolutely critical. A missed payment, or a payment to the wrong company can spell disaster. There are so many fraudulent practices out there, stealing, hijacking and holding hostage domain names.

That’s why it’s a valuable service we’re happy to provide for many customers. We know what’s real and what’s fake because we do this every day, and we know how to take care of domain names. We have hundreds in our accounts.

So, take a step toward tranquility for you and your business. Let us handle your domain names so you don’t have to worry. That’s what Interfanatic The Works Domain Concierge is all about.

Interfanatic and Tranquility

Jefferson is such an interesting character of his time. Many love, some loathe, but none rightly protest the idea that he was a man of action. Aside from being a President of this country, a revolutionary, and a Statesmen, he was a creative visionary. And yeah, he was other, not-so-positive things. But one thing he sought – not for himself, but for the people of his country (whether he considered them all or not) – was tranquility.

Today, we read his words, “…that all men are created equal…”, and I, for one, choose to interpret that phrase to say that “…all humankind are created equal…” A lofty ideal, which we take to be self-evident. Not everyone was or is treated equal, but it’s something to strive after. And I know not everyone shares that aspiration when they read Jefferson and Franklin’s Declaration. But that’s how I choose to view it. And for me, working for true equality among all people will create a great, global tranquility. It’s an idealistic, perhaps naive vision. But the work is worth it.

This week’s image:
Interfanatic‘s founder, Ryan Delane, takes or creates every image you see in our social feed.

Tranquility, an Interfanatic Quality.
Interfanatic Digital Marketing founder Ryan Delane takes or creates every image you see in our social feed.

This was a fun, old-timey still life I created for this week’s social. We see the Sea of Tranquility. Some old coins. Old stamps. When there was no TV, and when a radio in a household was yet a novelty, coin collecting was a great American pastime.

Tranquility: Palos Verdes Coin Exchange – Interfanatic Customer Spotlight Read More »

Resolution: Affordable Bookkeeping & Payroll – Interfanatic Customer Spotlight

Cool Stuff on the Web, Customer Spotlight

“Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed, is more important than any other one thing.“⁠
– Abraham Lincoln⁠

Candy Messer is a powerhouse.

It was fun working with her. She runs a tight ship, and she does a great job for her customers. And it is that way because she decided it would be that way. And she makes it that way. And she set down the law that this is how it shall be at her business.

Mind you, she’s not a miser. She’s just determined.

Like Honest Abe tells us, it is our own resolution to succeed that matters most.

Perhaps it was Lincoln’s resolution that brought the end of the Civil War. Perhaps it was a little divine intervention.

It could be the same for Candy. A champion for women-owned business; a champion for small and local business.

We had a lot of fun working with Candy, first updating her website, then designing her a new one. Since then, her company has grown, and she’s taken her site in-house. But she and her business are just the kind of local small business we enjoy working with.

Candy Messer’s Affordable Bookkeeping & Payroll is an inspiration of resolution.

Resolution: Affordable Bookkeeping & Payroll – Interfanatic Customer Spotlight Read More »

AffordableBookkeepingAndPayroll.com Makes the Most of its Dollars – and Yours!

Uncategorized

Candy Messer’s team at Affordable Bookkeeping and Payroll Services in Harbor City, CA, is great at making their dollars work for them. It’s a freindly, scrappy small business – just the kind we love. They do a great job of taking care of your books or payroll so that you can concentrate on your business.

AffordableBookkeepingAndPayroll.com started out as a small project and Candy recently came to WSmad looking for a few upgrades. We gave her a “refreshing quote” on her home page and added some testimonials and resources (forms) for her clients.

What sets Candy apart from her competitors is her price and her performance. If you’re accustomed to ADP for your payroll, she’ll save you a ton of money and provide far better service. If you’re accustomed to doing your own bookkeeping, she’ll take that hassle off your hands and she won’t hurt your pocketbook. Her staff is professional, polite and helpful – she really has put together a great small business.

WSmad is very excited to be working with Candy, and we highly recommend her services.

To learn more, check out www.AffordableBookkeepingAndPayroll.com.

AffordableBookkeepingAndPayroll.com Makes the Most of its Dollars – and Yours! Read More »